1. Technical Field
One or more embodiments of the present invention generally relate to thermal management. In particular, certain embodiments relate to limiting the average power of devices in a computing system based on thermal influences.
2. Discussion
As the components of modern day computing systems continue to grow in functionality and complexity, computer designers and manufacturers are often faced with challenges associated with corresponding increases in power and energy consumption. For example, increased power consumption in a microprocessor tends to lead to a corresponding increase in temperature, which can negatively affect the performance of the processor itself as well as the performance of nearby devices. Thus, each device in a computing system may be viewed as a source of heat with regard to other “target” devices in the system.
Some models for thermal control rely on limiting the performance of the thermal source in an effort to constrain the source device's power consumption, which in turn may constrain the source device's thermal influence on the target device. Such an approach may not be an optimal solution, however, as the source device's power consumption (and therefore thermal output) at a given performance level can be highly dependent upon the workload applied to the source device. Because workloads can often be inconsistent over time given the complex interactions and varied usage models for typical systems, selecting a specific performance level may not result in the exact thermal response desired. Indeed, even if the desired thermal response is achieved occasionally, variability in the system workload may continue to undermine the thermal stability of the relationships in the system.